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HBO: You're a filmmaker who isn't afraid to take on
"heavy" subjects. What drew you to this story?
Steven Okazaki: It was a fascinating story: Nhem En was a
sixteen year old soldier for the Khmer
Rouge, and it was his job to take photos of
their prisoners. For the most part, they
were all fellow Cambodians who were
captured, tortured and killed, or sent
directly to the killing fields. The photos are
unforgettable.
They're essentially ID photos, but they used
a large format camera. No one's exactly sure
why. It was the 1970s, so they could've easily
done Polaroids or used 35 millimeter. But
they did these striking large formal portraits
and seeing them, you experience
something of what they're feeling, knowing
they're going to be killed.
For me, the most disturbing photos are of the
few people who seem to reflexively smile
because there's a camera in front of them.
They're unaware of what's about to happen,
and their smiles are very disturbing. But
most of the people - you can see it in their
eyes - they know they're going to die.
The other thing that drew me to the project
was just the question of what would you do if
you were in that situation? This is the first
time I've done a film where the main character
was not someone I was drawn to as a person.
The main character of this film is kind of dead
inside, there's this coldness to him that's
frightening. I mean, he didn't give a wink or a
smile to the children that he was
photographing, that he knew were going to
die. He didn't offer anybody a glass of water,
or console them in any way. To me, that's
unimaginable.
HBO: Is that where the title grew out of?
Steven Okazaki: The title was (HBO's) Sheila Nevins' idea.
I was motivated to make the film because
of the images. Except for the opening of the
film, there's no archival footage to tell the
story. The film is told through victim's
faces and the faces of the Cambodian
people today. So for me the film was about
the victims of the Khmer Rouge and the
dignity in their faces as they realize their
fate. I was not comfortable with the
photographer and his complicity. Calling
the film "The Conscience of Nhem En" put a
weight on it that initially worried me. I
didn't want anyone to think we were
honoring Nhem En. But Sheila was right.
It is about conscience. It's about
everybody's conscience. Nhem En wouldn't
allow himself to process whether what he was
doing was right or wrong. He has no
conscience.
HBO: There are tremendously powerful scenes with
some of the survivors. What was it like
capturing those moments?
Steven Okazaki: The three people in the film who survived the
prison were all very willing to participate. They
had to share their stories, and their pain.
And what was really striking and moving was
that each time they went back to the prison it
was so painfully real for them. It wasn't
recalling an emotion. As soon as they were
there they were living it again. It was coming
from a really fresh memory. And what's
shocking is that this was thirty years ago. I
was completely unprepared for how fresh it
was in people's lives, and how real the pain
was.
HBO: You frame the film with the faces of ordinary
people on the street, some wary, some
smiling. What was your intention with that?
Steven Okazaki: Wherever we were while making the film,
whether we were walking into a marketplace
or driving in the car, you felt this really
powerful fear everywhere. There's a look of
sort of trepidation. The fear from thirty years
ago is still a part of life in Cambodia, even
now. I noticed it from the first moments we
were there. But when you looked someone in
the eye and communicated that you weren't
there to hurt them or rip them off, people
immediately responded with such kindness.
Through the whole filming, I struggled with
how much cruelty was in the story, and how
much pain there was in people's lives. I was
really searching for a way to find something
that would give the story a little hope. And in
the final interviews with everyone we talked
to, it was difficult finding that. So we decided
to echo the photos from the 1970s and do our
own portraits of people on the street, in the
marketplaces and the ghettos all over the city.
Some of the people were looking sort of dead
serious at the camera, and they don't break at
all. But there's still a little sparkle in people's
eyes. And that was just a way of getting back
to humanity, and of echoing what the one
survivor says in the film at the end, to remind
us of how precious life is.
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